Same medium brown sand, same medium waves

Posted on 2016.09.05 at 21:50

Dear Jammies,

Remember the time we got home from the beach after a long weekend, and I was watching Rascal in the bath while you took a shower and Rascal took an epically large crap, and I couldn't handle it so I fetched you out of the shower and gave you the shitsplosion of a tub full of bath toys, while I transferred Rascal to the other bathroom, which was now vacant, and splashed around with the clean baby for awhile? Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Love, Heebie

How was the beach? Mostly great! Noticeably easier than last year! Parts felt like an actual vacation, with R&R and midday naps. We rented a big house with three other families. We cooked communal meals and lazed around on the big deck into the night.

Who loved the beach the most? Probably Rascal, who screamed continuously, sustaining one very high note happily for about the first hour that he was in the waves. He was beside himself with joy. The mud, the sand, the waves, and more waves, and even more waves. He liked being knocked down by the waves. He liked lying down so that the tiniest waves would still break over him. That seems awful to me, but he liked it. He liked having saltwater in his face and mouth.

Who liked the beach the least? Probably Ace, although she played happily in the sand, and hung out cheerfully with the grown-ups under the EZ-up. What did people do at the beach before EZ-ups? My memory from Crescent Beach, FL, growing up, is of regular umbrellas resting on the ground, casting a shadow over low-slung beach chairs. Or that's what we did, plus sitting on the tailgate of the Suburban. Maybe that's why beach chairs are only two or three inches off the ground, so that they fit under regular umbrellas.

Which beach do we go to? Port Aransas, on Mustang Island, next to Corpus Christi. It's a good beach for childhood, because you have plenty of room to be impressed by more glamorous beaches later on. It's the kind of beach where the sand is medium brown and you can drive on the beach. So, just like Crescent Beach. It's like drinking wine: maybe you don't want to get used to the good stuff because then you can't enjoy the shitty kind.

It got very choppy on Sunday when a storm blew in. Everyone hurried to take down their EZ-ups and pack up their stuff, and those who dallied or who had weaker EZ-ups saw them destroyed. Boogie boards wrested away and cartwheeled violenty down the beach. Pokey, Hawaii and I were in the water, enjoying the bigger waves until, abruptly, it was time to go. All the adults moved about urgently, sand flew everywhere, and Pokey worked himself up into a full blown panic attack. He was crying and hysterically scared, and I ushered him and Hawaii and Rascal towards the rental house, leaving Jammies behind to get all the stuff. I think it was the urgency that freaked him out. He was sobbing and scared to death the whole walk home. At home, he was panicking about getting everything inside, when I pointed across the street at another family, on their balcony, and said, "Look. They're sitting in chairs, reading. Look how calm they are." He loosened a little, but didn't fully calm down until he was in the bath tub with Rascal.

(E. Messily and Ace were already at home, because Ace had asked to leave a few hours earlier, "so I can lay down in a bed." She was asleep on E., on the couch.)

...........

Heebieville is hosting a weeklong Mermaid Festival, later this month. It is a very apt choice for the town. Historically, our claim to fame was this kitschy roadside attraction. The Aquamaids put on underwater shows. There was an underwater ampitheater and the Aquamaids would perform behind glass: this is how we eat a sandwich underwater! This is how we swing on swings, underwater! There were little tubes for them to breathe air, and they had to stay underwater for an entire show.

(via) That is the same place that Jammies and I got married, in case you were reading here in 2009. (Although the kitchsy roadside attraction closed in the 1990s and was replaced by a nature center with a mini-shrine to the heyday.)

This is a weeklong Mermaid Festival, not an Aquamaid Festival, but we can overlook the historical inaccuracy. Here are the other reasons it's an apt choice: this town loves the river fanatically, this town is sort of silly and artsy, and this town does not take itself too seriously. Festivities include a parade and a Mermaid Society Ball and a daytime festival.

All of this is a longwinded way to announce that I bought a beautiful green and gold caftan for the Mermaid Society Ball. I am planning on dressing as Tennille to Jammies' Captain. The dress code is "River chic and other creatively inspired evening attire" so I'm pretty sure my new dress is just what the Captain ordered. I'm very excited.

............

This is a weird name for a church:

It seems a little dystopian. You were explicitly told not to worship Eikons.